O Air -- My Understanding

[2552phxcrzr]

We just booked a cruise on Riviera for August — Rome to Barcelona. Normally we do our own air, but in this instance, it might make sense to use O Air. We would definitely deviate as we will want to arrive several days prior to embarkation. We are gold level O Club members, so we will use the perk … thus nothing out of pocket as admin fees.

 

I have already researched flights on my own and have an idea of routes/fares to help us decide whether we should use O Air or not.

 

I have reviewed the many threads and want to make sure my understanding of the ins-and-outs of O Air are accurate before I contact Oceania (there is no travel agent to involve this time).

 

Here’s how I understand the process:

• I can begin discussing air arrangements 270 days out. (For this cruise that was last month, so I plan to start ASAP.)
  

• 
  
  • QUESTION: The current air credit is $1000pp. Could this amount drop lower the longer I wait to remove the included air?
    

• I can start by just requesting date deviation and then ask for airline/routing deviations as necessary once I see the recommended flights from O.
  

• 
  
  • QUESTIONS: The O agent I talked to at the time I booked the cruise said we could deviate our return to travel from our disembarkation port to a destination other than our home airport (Barcelona to Milan or Rome instead of back to the US). Is this accurate? Has anyone done this?
    

• There is an up-charge to upgrade from economy to PE ($199) or Business (restricted — $1899) … this is based on current information for the cruise we booked.
  

• 
  
  • QUESTIONS: Is this per person for both inbound and outbound, or per person per leg? Can I request different cabins for different legs (for ex. business on the long haul to Europe going over and economy or premium economy for the inter-Europe trip … assuming we can deviate our return port to fly from Barcelona back to Italy instead of to the US)?
    

• Once final payment is made, I can request the tickets be issued at that time and not wait for O to issue per their own schedule closer to departure.
  

• If the airline allows seat selection and I have provided O Air with my preferences, the flights will be ticketed with seats.
  

• 
  
  • QUESTIONS: Can I access my reservation online to re-select seats? Is it possible to upgrade our tickets by working directly with the airline using miles or miles/cash?
    

OTHER QUESTIONS:

• Can we do one way O air and get the credit for the return?
  

• What is the maximum number of days pre- and post-cruise that we deviate from embarkation/disembarkation date?
  

• Is there any information on the O website about O Air? I saw some generic information, but not an FAQ or similar.
  

• Where do I get the O Air contact information?
  

I think that covers it. I would appreciate any thoughts. Thank you in advance.

[Petoonya]

Question for you. Did you book with a TA, or directly with O? If with a TA why not utilize their service and present your questions to them? Someone more experienced than I will certainly answer but I always go to my TA first.

[su-arizona]

My TA just finished arranging our O air deviation at 270 days out. I'm definitely no expert, and sadly me or my TA can no longer speak directly to the Air Deviation department (it used to be difficult but possible). We used to do our own air, but with O-Life discounts and $149 premium upgrade, the $ advantage to using O air is too great.

 

Our premium upgrade is $149 each way for each person. The upgrade applies only to the transoceanic flights, not necessarily flights within Europe. In my case, I always research exactly what flights I want and have my TA negotiate with O to get those flights. It often costs a bit more to get those flights (on the ones we just booked, it was $100 pp extra) but it's worth it to me, and less expensive than booking premium economy separately. I saw what Oceania would have booked for me, and while the flights were okay, they involved 2 stops and about 2 hours more travel time than the one stop flights I chose. In this case, I asked my TA to get seats reserved for the transatlantic flights at the time we agreed to the air deviation, and she did so. In the past I have been able to obtain and change seat assignments on the airline website, but that might depend on the specific airline.

 

The air credit amount has changed for cruises in the past, and I expect that is still the case. I haven't been able to find any specific info on air on the Oceania web site, and I doubt it exists. I think perhaps the current custom air department serves all the NCL cruises lines, based on some email exchanges. Your air contacts occur through your TA or the Oceania rep who sold you the cruise if you booked it yourself.

 

I have seen other posts on this forum that say you can get O to issue tickets early, l but it hasn't worked for me. I've also seen other posts discussing using points/miles, but I've never tried it with Oceania flights.

 

All this is my own experience; I'm sure there are others who may have different information. Good luck with all your questions - if you get answers be sure to share them here!

[YoHoHo]

Your understanding is very good and questions nicely framed but a lot of variables.

 

I'll start and will be corrected.

 

"We just booked a cruise on Riviera for August — Rome to Barcelona. Normally we do our own air, but in this instance, it might make sense to use O Air. We would definitely deviate as we will want to arrive several days prior to embarkation. We are gold level O Club members, so we will use the perk … thus nothing out of pocket as admin fees.

 

I have already researched flights on my own and have an idea of routes/fares to help us decide whether we should use O Air or not.

 

I have reviewed the many threads and want to make sure my understanding of the ins-and-outs of O Air are accurate before I contact Oceania (there is no travel agent to involve this time).

 

Here’s how I understand the process:

 

• I can begin discussing air arrangements 270 days out. (For this cruise that was last month, so I plan to start ASAP.)
  

 

• 
  
  • 
    
    • QUESTION: The current air credit is $1000pp. Could this amount drop lower the longer I wait to remove the included air?"
      

    Yes.

   

 

• I can start by just requesting date deviation and then ask for airline/routing deviations as necessary once I see the recommended flights from O.
  

 

• 
  
  • QUESTIONS: The O agent I talked to at the time I booked the cruise said we could deviate our return to travel from our disembarkation port to a destination other than our home airport (Barcelona to Milan or Rome instead of back to the US). Is this accurate? Has anyone done this?
    
  If have not done this but believe it is possible not unlike one can, within limits fly into a city other than embarkation city i.e fly inot Madrid and make you own way to Barcelona to board. Same as a deviation to fly in 2 days before or 2 months before. There is a line somewhere but is there a hard and fast rule? I don't know if there is a formulated restriction but suspect one determined by the O air dept
  .

 

• There is an up-charge to upgrade from economy to PE ($199) or Business (restricted — $1899) … this is based on current information for the cruise we booked.
  

 

• 
  
  • QUESTIONS: Is this per person for both inbound and outbound, or per person per leg?
    The PE surcharge offer is per person, each way. Bear in mind the PE portion is not on domestic legs, if any,
    
  • Can I request different cabins for different legs (for ex. business on the long haul to Europe going over and economy or premium economy for the inter-Europe trip … assuming we can deviate our return port to fly from Barcelona back to Italy instead of to the US)?
    Often the flights don't even have PE in Europe. I doubt if this type of request will be covered under the PE/BC promo but could be covered under a "it will cost you more, much more" surcharge on a deviation request (see bellow)
    

   

 

• Once final payment is made, I can request the tickets be issued at that time and not wait for O to issue per their own schedule closer to departure.
  

 

• If the airline allows seat selection and I have provided O Air with my preferences, the flights will be ticketed with seats.
  

 

• 
  
  • QUESTIONS: Can I access my reservation online to re-select seats? Is it possible to upgrade our tickets by working directly with the airline using miles or miles/cash?
    

  I this will be dependent on the airline, some might, some might not, plus the class of the ticket purchased

OTHER QUESTIONS:

• Can we do one way O air and get the credit for the return?
  

yes

 

• What is the maximum number of days pre- and post-cruise that we deviate from embarkation/disembarkation date?
  

I would like to know too but maybe per case basis 9and where you are flying)

 

• Is there any information on the O website about O Air? I saw some generic information, but not an FAQ or similar.
  

 

• Where do I get the O Air contact information?
  

I've booked through TAs. I don't think you can speak with the air department directly but go through a booking rep at O as they have your booking. A TA once arranged a conference call with O's air to cut down on the back and forth as I had too many questions, was not making myself clear, had too many variables, was driving her to distraction, email was not very efficient in that case. Otherwise it has always worked well for us.

 

I think that covers it. I would appreciate any thoughts. Thank you in advance. "

 

The are two parts to a standard deviation. The administration fee of $175 pp PLUS a possible additional charge that the request costs.

 

For example VYR<-> BCN on Thursday.

 

1. Want to deviate to Wednesday. The same flights by the same airlines are available every week day. O offers the the same flights on Wed they would have given on Thurs. Cost is the $175 admin fee.

2. Want to deviate to Wednesday but on a specific airline and at a specific (choice) time. These flights cost more than what they normally offer so O offers them to you for the $175 admin fee PLUS an additional flight cost. I believe if the cost is small they eat it. Otherwise it is on you.

3. But I want to fly into Madrid not BCN and out of Paris not BCN. Depending on the closeness and the availability of flights this may well fall into the "at additional cost" deviation as in 2 above. i.e.maybe into Madrid, not BCN and out of Madrid not BCN could be no extra charge but out of Rome will be.

 

 

 

 

Expand Signature

[GICNJC]

All good questions. As to number of days pre and post cruise, it is 30 days on each end. We had asked the Question before our last cruise. We ended up doing our own flights.

[ABoatNerd]

We recently explored O air and deviation with our TA.

 

We decided no - mainly because seat selection will not be confirmed until 60 days before departure (on the official paperwork from O) sent to us for review by our TA. Even though you have paid in full for the cruise well before that.

 

We purchased our own air.

[2552phxcrzr]

Question for you. Did you book with a TA, or directly with O? If with a TA why not utilize their service and present your questions to them? Someone more experienced than I will certainly answer but I always go to my TA first.

 

As I noted above, there is no TA to involve this time. I’ll be discussing all of this with O but I am trying to understand the program first since I did not find details on the O website.

[2552phxcrzr]

Thanks to those who responded. Hope to get working on O Air this week. I have a feeling that with the BC upgrade being pp each way, we will likely take the credit and do our own air, but you never know ... we might be surprised.

[ORV]

We recently explored O air and deviation with our TA.

 

We decided no - mainly because seat selection will not be confirmed until 60 days before departure (on the official paperwork from O) sent to us for review by our TA. Even though you have paid in full for the cruise well before that.

 

We purchased our own air.

 

Absolutely incorrect. Apparently you were using an inexperienced TA with Oceania. Many of us have confirmed seats well before 60 days. As an example I've had confirmed seats for a flight in mid July since the middle of Oct 2017.

 

It is even more possible with a paid in full cruise. At that point you can get the tickets issued, seats assigned, (if they're not already) and be able to move them around.

 

There are many nuances and variables, that's where it helps to have a TA experienced with all of them.

 

To the OP, since you're an experienced cruiser I'm sure you have reasons for not using a TA, but this is exactly the type of situation that they are worth their weight in gold.

[2552phxcrzr]

Yes, I do have my reasons for not using a TA this time ORV ... thanks for the seat info.

[Hawaiidan]

The problems with O air is the many unknowns and possibilities, and restrictions and fees for the past cruises I have on all except 1 elected to get my own arrangements and do so with abundant FF miles which( I horde). Thus is easy for me to get a rt Business/First class ticket in California to Europe for under $3000.00 pp not the 5800 -6500 regular fares.

I have entered a phase of life where business class in not a luxury it is a necessity..

 

Start saving miles NOW if you have not done so already( you can get them for everything from gum to taxes) And you can buy enough miles to still save $$$ ....

 

Being in control of the whole process flights, times,seats. aircraft, and airlines eliminates all the unknowns the OP expressed worry over

[2552phxcrzr]

The problems with O air is the many unknowns and possibilities, and restrictions and fees for the past cruises I have on all except 1 elected to get my own arrangements and do so with abundant FF miles which( I horde). Thus is easy for me to get a rt Business/First class ticket in California to Europe for under $3000.00 pp not the 5800 -6500 regular fares.

I have entered a phase of life where business class in not a luxury it is a necessity..

 

Start saving miles NOW if you have not done so already( you can get them for everything from gum to taxes) And you can buy enough miles to still save $$$ ....

 

Being in control of the whole process flights, times,seats. aircraft, and airlines eliminates all the unknowns the OP expressed worry over

 

I’m not sure I would class my questions as worries ... just getting my understanding of O Air verified. Except for our first cruise — an open-jaw to Alaska in 2001 — we have always done our own air ... and the likelihood is good we will do it again this time, unless O pull a rabbit out of the hat ;)

[llarsen]

Our experience:

 

We used a TA for our upcoming Oceania cruise (only because we received an additional $300 OBC). Our original TA was wonderful, but unfortunately left the company and was replaced with this awful TA we currently have. Honestly, if we were within the time period to transfer our booking to Oceania, we would have given up the $300 OBC to do so.

 

We knew exactly what flights we wanted (involving a pre-cruise stay in Florence).

The problem with booking through a TA and using O air is that you cannot speak with Oceania directly, all requests go through your TA. (Our TA was on vacation during the time we wanted to book our flights) so we had to wait for her to get back, and then wait again for her to decide when it was convenient to get back to us on quotes and so on (long story).

 

We normally just take the air credit but this time we were able to get Premium Economy for around $300 more than purchasing Economy on our own, and much less than the price of purchasing Premium Economy on our own.

We did request a quote for one way PE and somehow it was $100 more (or maybe less, can't remember) but it was not worth it, so we purchased it both directions and are looking forward to it this coming June for our trip to Italy!

 

We used are Air New Zealand going:

First I called Air New Zealand to see if the seats we wanted in PE were available, and then requested them with our deviation request.

We could not access them on the Air New Zealand site even after we received our air confirmation from Oceania.

 

We used British Air for return:

We did not request a particular seat but Oceania did a fine job selecting for us.

We were able to access them right away online after receiving our confirmation, with the option to change seats.

 

Air New Zealand confirmed that we were in the seats we requested but that they technically were not purchased. This made us nervous since Oceania does not ticket until after final payment.

We decided to pay our cruise off early and requested Oceania to "ticket" our air, which they did within 24 hours.

 

No more worries, now we are just looking forward to our trip!

[2552phxcrzr]

Thanks for sharing your experience llarsen.

[Hawaiidan]

it is good to know that premium economy , as is Business and first, vary wildly from one carrier, aircraft or route. Its not an industry standard by any means.... do some home work on Seat Guru a Business class seats are worse than another airlines coach... KNOW what your getting and from who

 

When O purchases your ticket it becomes a third party deal, Only O can change or modify it after issue not you.... if a flight gets cancelled you cant change to a different one..it has to be done by O. I have seen some real problems using third party tickets...like form Price Line,and similar Dealing with an airline direct is by far a better route

[CruiseAficionado]

I have entered a phase of life where business class in not a luxury it is a necessity..

 

+1 Agree wholeheartedly with Hawaiidan on this.

[happy cruzer]

I hope I did not miss this information in the discussion. If you book O air with deviation, when do you pay the amounts? When is the air portion forfeited if you have to cancel the cruise?

 

Torn between booking early and possible cancellation due to work requirements. This is for the Nov 13, 2018 Transatlantic on Riviera. Air credit plus deviation fee is $625 pp and our home port is DFW. Any advice welcome.

[ShopperfiendTO]

I hope I did not miss this information in the discussion. If you book O air with deviation, when do you pay the amounts? When is the air portion forfeited if you have to cancel the cruise?

 

Torn between booking early and possible cancellation due to work requirements. This is for the Nov 13, 2018 Transatlantic on Riviera. Air credit plus deviation fee is $625 pp and our home port is DFW. Any advice welcome.

 

You pay the deviation fee at the time you accept the deviation. This fee non-refundable even if you cancel (and if you make further changes to your air arrangement, you have to pay the deviation fee again).

 

The air portion itself is separate from the deviation. It is part of your cruise fare so the cancellation fees for that would follow the payment of the cruise fare.

 

I think you can choose O air for outbound only, inbound only or both. For transoceanic open-jaws such as your cruise, I think it is usually a better deal to take O`s air for the over-ocean portion, and perhaps for both unless one-way airfare from Miami (I'm guessing this is the arrival port) to DFW is very inexpensive.

 

You really have to do the math to figure out what works, but keep in mind that if you take O's air that you don't have to pay for the airfare (and risk forfeiture of the payment assuming you normally book discounted non-refundable tickets) until final cruise payment.

[happy cruzer]

Thank you for the help. Now I thought of more questions. What if the airline cancels or changes the flight you picked and paid air deviation on? Can you select another flight or airline without and extra charge? Can the quote for the air deviation change if you haven't paid for the airfare?

 

I looked at the one way fares and they are very high so I am pretty sure I will use the O air. Thanks.

[rallydave]

Thank you for the help. Now I thought of more questions. What if the airline cancels or changes the flight you picked and paid air deviation on? Can you select another flight or airline without and extra charge? Can the quote for the air deviation change if you haven't paid for the airfare?

 

I looked at the one way fares and they are very high so I am pretty sure I will use the O air. Thanks.

 

Not sure where you live but, in the US, flight changes do occur and flights do get cancelled. With a booked flight the airline will put you on another flight with a similar time and day. While the airlines should inform you of changes, it doesn't happen at times so it behooves you to keep checking on your flight schedule on the airline website. Sometimes the change might be only a few minutes but, any change allows you to request a different flight of the airline and we took advantage of a 10 minute change to use a ticket we bought to change to our preferred flight that had been more expensive than the flight we booked. Good deal.

 

Once you are booked on a flight, your contract is with the airline and not Oceania and while Oceania might help you you need to work with the airline to get where you need to be when you need to be there. The Oceania clearly state this information in the Terms and Conditions. No need to select another flight or airline thru Oceania. Sometimes an airline will put you on a different airlines flight if necessary.

 

Believe once you pay your deviation fee and any upcharge, if necessary, your fare is locked in. You don't actually pay the airfare, it is included in the price of the cruise.

[Yorkshirewanderers]

Hi, I always book flights separately because I get full control of the routing and I don't want to be a hostage to fortune with Oceania. One thing to bear in mind is that mixing classes a lot of travel has issues. You need to look carefully at hold and hand baggage allowances as you will find that usually the lower of the limits applies, so for example, if you fly transatlantic business or premium, you will be able to bring 2 or 3 cases but you won't be able to use the same allowance in economy in Europe. You will most likely be able to check your cases all the way through but the checked allowance will be the economy one, not the business or premium economy one. Premium Economy as such does not exist on short haul European flights so if you are carrying several bags you would need to upgrade to business for the European sector or pay excess baggage.

 

We are about to fly UK to Tahiti and Oceania offered business UK to LAX but only economy LAX to Tahiti which was useless. We then asked them to do Air France business class for the entire route but the upgrade cost was more than we could buy the business class tickets direct. Therefore we asked them to refund us the airfare credit which was GBP 1,500 (around USD 2,100) per person. Letting Oceania do the upgrades for us would have cost us more than GBP 3,000 extra which was about one third of the cruise only price on an 18 night cruise ... you have to look into these things very carefully.

 

In my opinion, (as long as you have independent traveller insurance) it is better to work it all out yourself so that you can get exactly the flights that you want well in advance ... long haul, the best fares in business are available as soon as they go on the market, one year in advance which is well before you know what Oceania are likely to book for you.

[2552phxcrzr]

As the OP, I am closing the loop. After completing all of our research, we took the credit and booked business class fare on Turkish Airlines ourselves. This works much better with our slightly-jiggled plans.

[Paulchili]

As the OP, I am closing the loop. After completing all of our research, we took the credit and booked business class fare on Turkish Airlines ourselves. This works much better with our slightly-jiggled plans.

 

If you have never flown on TK, I believe that you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Not only have they been voted Europe’s # 1 airline for many years running ( a relative honor as many other polls are) but in my experience their business class beats Lufthansa business A 380 in EVERY way (service, food, friendliness, seats, etc). It was a great surprise to me and we are flying them again later this year.

Bon Voyage

[Yorkshirewanderers]

Yes, Turkish Airlines in Business s indeed a good choice. You have done what we would have done.

[2552phxcrzr]

If you have never flown on TK, I believe that you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Not only have they been voted Europe’s # 1 airline for many years running ( a relative honor as many other polls are) but in my experience their business class beats Lufthansa business A 380 in EVERY way (service, food, friendliness, seats, etc). It was a great surprise to me and we are flying them again later this year.

Bon Voyage

 

We travel to Turkey annually to visit family and THY (the initials in Turkish) has been our go to airline from Houston. It will be the first time we will be making the flight in business class, however, so we are looking forward to that. As good as the service has been in economy, it doesn’t surprise me that business class gets high grades from so many fliers. We took advantage of promotional fare which made the fare quite palatable ;)